[Atmob-discuss] Mercury... The Movie!

[Stephen Moshier]

Are these pictures showing the real rotation of the planet?   I thought 
it was generally believed Mercury always shows the same face toward the 
Sun, until radar observations proved otherwise in the mid 1960's.  Is a 
backyard scope now able to demonstrate that, too?



John Boudreau wrote:
> Over the last few weeks I've been imaging Mercury with my Celestron 11 and Imaging Source DMK21 video camera.
>
> I've assembled 5 frames into an animation of Mercury's rotation and phase changes as it recently approached and passed greatest western elongation. Much of the visible surface are regions that weren't imaged by Mariner 10 on the mid-70's, but will eventually be covered by the Messenger spacecraft that starts a multiple flyby sequence in January, leading up to eventually orbiting Mercury in 2011. 
>
> http://home.comcast.net/~jeboud/mercury.htm
>
> ---John Boudreau
>
> _______________________________________________
> Atmob-discuss mailing list
> Atmob-discuss at atmob.org
> http://lists.atmob.org/mailman/listinfo/atmob-discuss
>